


Wrecklamation

by 3amepiphany



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Demoscene, M/M, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-01
Updated: 2019-11-01
Packaged: 2021-01-16 10:21:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21269456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3amepiphany/pseuds/3amepiphany
Summary: Saarbrücken seemed a world away, and precisely where Yuri would rather be than hitting the end-of-season performance circuit again.  It was obvious that Otabek felt the same and knew Yuri was likely going to ask anyways, so he’d already procured a flight ticket as well as an extra entrance lanyard for the younger skater as his plus-one for the event that they were here for.A weekend away from the ice and a chance to get a strained relationship back on a better track, but not a weekend away from pitfalls and competition.





	Wrecklamation

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2019 OtaYuri Big Bang.
> 
> Many thanks to Henning's of Saarbrücken, Revision, and the many Demosceners that make this party and others happen. Special thanks to Logicoma and their 2018 Tracked Music demo "Wrecklamation" for the wide net of inspiration they cast over this one.
> 
> Accompanying art by event partner SamyGeeFox : https://imgur.com/5AROeRs

Saarbrücken seemed a world away, and precisely where Yuri would rather be than hitting the end-of-season performance circuit again. It was obvious that Otabek felt the same and knew Yuri was likely going to ask anyways, so he’d already procured a flight ticket as well as an extra entrance lanyard for the younger skater as his plus-one for the event that they were here for.

The Olympic-year season had been hard enough on both of them - the usual travel restrictions and competition dates made it nearly impossible for them to spend any time with one another, on top of rumors of Yakov’s own retirement from coaching buzzing about Yuri and his rinkmates, and just the media cover in general taking a weird new intensity in coverage since the Olympics that neither of them cared much for.

Especially Otabek.

It had followed him from Pyeongchang to LA to New York to Milan. When the almost-immediately successive Worlds was over, though, all of that weight shifted when he landed in Ibiza. Amid other athlete-celebrities, influencers, and musicians, he was able to catch a bit of a break and even took an offered opportunity to assist with a skating camp while he was there.

Yuri, on the other hand, took part in Fantasy on Ice at Yakov and Lilia’s pressing and at Yuuri’s invite, and had very little time after Worlds to get ready to participate in it. He had even less time after FOI to put towards the following season. Because of this he was frustrated and it showed in his performances and his scores, and even in his interviews. Vancouver was a stumble, Saitama was even worse. He still managed to take the podium at both, but Yakov made the comment at one point that Yuri was starting to settle back into his impetuous nature. Lilia scolded him for saying it aloud of course, and though there wasn’t a knock-down, dragged-out fight about it, it took goading from both Georgi and Mila to get the younger skater to stay at the estate through to the end of the season.

Yuri confided to Otabek that he’d wanted to start looking at the possibility of taking on Viktor as a coach if neither Viktor nor Yakov truly were going to retire and put forth any kind of change, and when Otabek put on the table that that sentiment really only seemed inflammatory, _that_ discussion ended in an awful fight neither of them had wanted to have - one that had even J.J.’s fans in a small tizzy on behalf of Yuri’s barely glossed-over anger and very public anger on social media, as Otabek wound up going stag to J.J. and Isabella’s wedding in Hawaii because of it all.

Eventually Yakov and Lilia let Yuri decline as many international shows as he wished. He spent most of that saved time throwing himself into several new routines instead, and working on a few university courses here and there. He also took a couple of days away from St. Petersburg to visit in Moscow, and to meet with Otabek while he was nearby. Otabek, who had very easily disappeared nearly off the social media grid entirely along with his laptop, skates, and a Japanese musician (introduced to him in LA by Leo and Yuuri) across Europe on a short tour leg while Almaty constructed a better ice rink. Well. His coach knew where he was at. And his mother and sister. And anyone attending the shows, who knew of him. Yuri had caught up with him at the concert, but there just wasn’t enough time and the venue was very reluctant to allow him backstage for too long. He watched from the bar at the back of the house and had just enough time to catch him in the parking lot for a bit before their bus was due off to the next stop on the tour. They apologized - not the parsed apologies they’d been shooting back and forth over the phone, but a solid in-person apology, standing there under a faintly flickering light. Kindly, Miyavi promised to get Otabek back in one piece and thanked Yuri for letting him borrow him. The Kazakh skater didn’t stay at home long once he was back, however. Almaty wasn’t fast-tracking the new facilities at all, so he and his coaching team had gone nearly straight overseas at Alain and Nathalie Leroy’s invite to stay and train in Montréal until the end of the 2019-2020 season.

They’d returned to competition that fall much more well-centered and much more learned and practiced and that got them both through the Grand Prix in Turin with some ease, but they had both finished Worlds in Montréal that spring by the skin of their teeth. Yuri was on the podium behind Yuuri _and_ Viktor, with Kenjirou Minami hot on his heels. He’d popped a quadruple axel jump and while he fell out of the landing, it was still his title to claim for attempting it - at a steep detraction of points, though. While Yakov did manage to keep himself in check the exit interviews brought up the very same concerns as the previous year. And it burned Yuri to the core just a bit deeper than it had before.

Otabek on the other hand had managed to push J.J. down a slot to round out the top six, excelling in utilizing the time spent and work done with the Leroy’s against his rinkmate yet again and adding another jump to his repertoire - three solid triples and one quad jump in one program was what had allowed him to pull forward in the end. For Otabek, it was tough to weather and it was hard-won and very earned, but he still thanked J.J. and his parents profusely and by name in interviews for assisting and hosting him and his coaching team again. It was very heartfelt. It hadn’t been the same as the last time he was there in Canada. At least for him.

J.J. had mistakenly taken this for posturing and later on made a heated comment to Otabek that had Alain pulling the Kazakh skater off of his son moments after. Despite it happening at a private party at the Leroy’s home, Alain wound up petitioning the ISU about it on each of their behalf to seek disregard of the incident. They were still awaiting either a resolution or citations over it.

But at the moment, all of that that was worlds away.

They were here in Saarbrücken. And not for skating.

Upon waking up Yuri had rolled over to look at Otabek, to watch him as he slept. Otabek was a heavy sleeper, but they’d also arrived in Germany so late that he may have really been in need of a good rest and Yuri didn’t want to interrupt that if he could help it anyways. Yet, at least. His features seemed much softer; he didn’t look as pensive in sleep as he did when he was awake and Yuri had found these moments to be favorites of his since the first time he’d had the opportunity to catch Otabek napping at an event. His hair, usually slicked straight back but now mussed by travel, hats, pillows and sleep, fell in his face like a mop. 

Yuri wanted to run his hand through it. He wanted to do that a lot, really, just run his hand through Otabek’s hair and trace along his ear with a finger, following down along his jawline and his lips. He wanted to put his hand up under Otabek’s shirt where it was pulling up over his stomach and side and wanted to get close and warm and satisfy that terrible curiosity of having another person to explore so intimately and maybe be touched in the same manner. He loved it. He’d had a taste of that at Pyeongchang and then a little more in Milan, and once apologies were had during Otabek’s tour date in Moscow there it was again in Grenoble and Sapporo. But he wanted more, and decidedly more than what they had allowed themselves. He wanted to make up for that here. He wanted them to be able to get through the talk they’d wanted to start at the airport last night but put off until today, knowing they still had to have it. He’d wanted to get to work on them and this thing between them and he wanted it to be a good weekend for them, but he also really just wanted to do away with it all and spend the next week holed up in the hotel room, perhaps acting on J.J.’s crude and inciting suggestion that they “just get laid already.”

He couldn’t help but feel upset about that on a few different levels. He knew Otabek had told J.J. in confidence well towards the start of his stay in Montréal that he and Yuri had been playing at becoming more than just friends but wanted to get serious about it now. It was just that distance and time were their biggest issue. Otabek was looking for advice, a sounding board, some insight. And he was asking someone he was comfortable having such a conversation with. Someone who knew.

It was petty. Isabella and J.J. had actually waited until they were _married_, and even _she_ thought it was petty. “You can’t get mad at someone you offered to teach when they excel at what they’ve learned - especially when you teach so well, and when he’s that good and that willing to listen to you,” she’d snapped at J.J. afterwards.

Otabek shifted onto his side with a sharp breath in and a grumbly breath out and this was where they were now, facing one another. Yuri held his own breath and almost didn’t realize that he had been, his eyes wide and his heart beating so unbearably loud that he was sure it was going to be the thing to wake Otabek up at any moment, tell-tale and guilty. Otabek’s necklace had shifted with him, the pendant hanging from it sliding into Yuri’s view. After a few tense moments of waiting to see if Otabek was still sleeping, he reached for it to examine it. Just as he’d taken it gently between his fingers, Otabek’s phone alarm went off, startling them both; Otabek even more so when he opened his eyes to see Yuri so close. He sat up quickly, fumbling around to shut the phone off. Then he lay back down, head sinking into the down-filled hotel pillow with a soft “phwump” sound. Yuri hadn’t moved at all; he just tried to lay there and calm down, suddenly aware that he was half-hard.

“I’m sorry,” Otabek said after some time, softly and in Russian.

Yuri scoffed, curling in on himself a bit now. “For what? It’s an alarm. It did what it needed to do.”

“Jarringly. ...I need more sleep.” He closed his eyes and sighed. “I should have set that for at least another hour from now."

Yuri put his hand out again, the one he’d used to look at the pendant, and gently patted his open palm down on Otabek’s cheek. “Hey. You’re in front of me. It’s been too long. I’m awake to see you and even better, to touch you. Wake up. Up, up.”

Hair still mussed and messy and in his face, Otabek gave him a small smile, opening his eyes again too. “Okay. Okay….! You and I both are very lucky that we don’t have to be anywhere until this afternoon, but it would do neither of us any good to let jet lag get to us, I suppose.”

“Exactly,” Yuri said, taking the opportunity now to move his hand down and then slide it up Otabek’s shirt. He’d barely even pressed the flat of his hand against Otabek’s stomach when the older skater sat up with an exaggerated stretch and a yawn, some of his joints popping loudly.

“Great. I didn’t get a chance to see what the amenities were here,” Otabek said, sitting up.

Yuri made a face.

“Don’t be obscene,” Otabek said teasingly, surely feeling Yuri’s eyes on the back of his head as he stepped into the bathroom.

The exercise room at their hotel was well-equipped. They had a nice run on the treadmills and a small lateral pull up competition, but went back to their room to continue with some partnered sit-ups, shower, and to have that talk that had been waiting for a few weeks.

Yuri sat down on the floor to stretch his legs out some more and to put his socks and shoes on for the day. Otabek sat behind him on the couch and took a brush to his hair, slicking it back to give him a French braid on either side. It was fairly long now, just past his shoulders and just as much trouble to keep tamed as it was still thin and didn’t like bobby pins at all, but Yuri was determined to let it grow out to piss Viktor off and to keep Lilia’s hands busy during performance preparation so she wouldn’t spend so much time losing her mind. His fans had mixed opinions, but he liked the jokes they would post about it. The latest one presumably came about because his free skate costume had chainette fringe - Leo had actually made the comment that he looked like Renaissance paintings of Mary Magdalene in the desert, and one fan overheard it, photoshopping Yuri’s head onto one of these paintings and tagging Leo when they’d posted it. Of course, Leo tagged Yuri.

Otabek hated the jokes, as they felt more mean-spirited than they were argued to be. He liked Yuri’s hair longer, liked the way it felt in his hands when he played with it. Liked tucking in all the little loose bits and pieces in quiet moments. Liked the soft wave it held for all of a blink of an eye when it was braided damp and let to dry before being undone. 

“People will be mad when I finally get rid of it all and do an undercut like yours but with a pompadour,” Yuri said, leaning his head back on Otabek’s lap as he’d finished snapping the elastic around the ends of the braids, and some of the hair too so it created a loose sort of half bun.

“No.”

“A mohawk.”

“No.”

“I’ll get designs buzzed into the short bit.”

“Please.”

“I’m not letting it get longer than this, really. Just don’t know if I want it for one more season like this or not, yet.”

“Bring the bowl cut back, Yura, that was adorable.”

“No,” Yuri said, mimicking the deadpanned responses Otabek had just given him. But then it all just tumbled out, finally. “Ah, who am I kidding? The ISU owns my whole ass and so does the state program, they just want their precious knife-footed prima ballerina back. I’d like to get to do my own thing if I’m not able to get past Piggy or Viktor... And not only for the galas. But not all of us can be like the great Nikiforov. His is a special sort of ‘suffering for ones art’. A struggle of the soul. No one wants to award me for struggling with the tailor between growth spurts and that’s all I’ve got going for me right now between being yelled at for style changes mid-prix. I know Viktor can give me that freedom again - like he did with Agape, but he wants another full year in competition, one more shot at the next Olympic run. Yakov says he’s not ready to take on a team, yet. And there’s still no word on if the state program would let him, anyways--”

Otabek interrupted him with a soft shushing sound, and said, “Yura, Yura, Yura. This has been a few years of agony, hasn’t it?”

“I want to start trying to spend more time with you, but less time angry while I do. It's just. I have so many more obligations now than I did even before going to Pyeongchang, and so many of them aren't mine, it pisses the hell out of me anymore.” He sighed. The older skater looked down at him, little bits of his own hair hanging in his face, and offered him a soft smile. That smile that no one else really saw, ever, save Yuri.

“Creative expression should always be fought hard for.”

“It shouldn’t come at the price of pissing everyone else off though. I get that the struggle itself is part of the art everyone wants to see, on top of what was accomplished through it, especially when it culminates in a failure or any lesser success. Sometimes art should just be done for the sake of doing it. And I’m like you, I hate the commodification of the off-season shows. But I’m still doing other peoples’ choreography, I’m still held to those timetables, and those are so much more exhausting than a regular season. All that makes me feel like a circus tiger doing the same rote tricks night after night.”

Otabek nodded in agreement. He did want to do his own show one day. Not a touring show but just a one-off exhibition, and he’d been kicking that around since the suggestion was made to him while he and Emil Nekola were watching the team skating events in Pyeongchang. He’d wanted to provide an outlet for skaters to do what he and Yuri had done - their own music, their own choreography, their own fun. Something that they could take charge of and do and be proud of, something separate from what they trot out for galas or touring shows. Phichit Chulanont had had similar plans for a while. It was just finding the time. He didn’t want to wait until they were all retired and doing pro-am events to keep sponsors on and airline points cycling. Otabek didn’t, either.

And Yuri knew it, and he felt terrible for complaining about everything. “I’m just… upset. And I’m lashing out at people I shouldn’t be upset with. Stepping on toes. Pushing people away. Including you.” He didn’t really have much more to say than that, so he stopped.

There was some time before Otabek said, “I’m frustrated too, if I can be honest. You work hard. You work hard and you fight hard for yourself. I’m glad you do but I also wish you wouldn’t have to. Not all art has to be like that. You are suffering to be able to say you can suffer.” Otabek brushed Yuri’s fringe aside and placed a kiss on his forehead. “Even if it’s not willingly. Working against the misconceptions of others. Making sacrifices. Expectations and all.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too, Yura.”

“I’m not throwing hands about it yet, I suppose,” he said, raising his fists up and mock-boxing a bit, giving Otabek a wink. 

“Hm. There is that,” he said, embarrassed again. He gave Yuri another kiss and said, “Let’s table this for now, hm? It’s a good start, but I still need to shower, too.”

As he disappeared to take that quick shower Yuri put the Weather Channel on the television just to have the background noise and used the little coffee maker to boil water for some instant oatmeal, and of course some coffee. After breakfast they each loaded up their backpacks with some snack bars, two cups of instant noodles and some fruit, and their laptops and chargers; Yuri felt he did a pretty good job of grocery shopping to fill up their little hotel room refrigerator the day before, as that needed to be the first thing to take care of due to the holiday once he’d arrived. The one thing he forgot was coffee creamer, but that was alright. For now. He wasn’t sure what else they would need throughout the day. Otabek did say that they were welcome at the Friday staff barbecue when that was set up and going - they could look at the schedules and the area maps once they were there. He did need to meet his collaborators and sit down with one to look the release over before submitting it to the officials on deadline (he’d gotten an email that seemed a little pressed) and to see where the other two parties were at with their productions and if any final touches were needed. He was prepared for his own set on Sunday, opting to mix something together loosely enough that he could lay some other samples on if he’d wanted. One of his collaborators said they’d bring their Launchpad for him to play around with and he was excited to take them up on that offer. They did have tickets for a beer seminar, though that was closer to 10 or 11 that night, otherwise the aftrernoon was theirs to wander around, watch and learn, and just relax for a bit.

E Werk, the building was called. They walked from the Hotel Mercure to an unmarked pickup point and took a very obviously marked bus from their hotel once it had arrived, sitting down near a couple of people speaking in tired French. This “shuttle” run made a few more stops along the way to pick up more attendees, and once they were on the drive to E Werk the Danish pair sitting a row up, behind the driver, spoke up in English to the riders around them, asking after “parties” and “handles”. The French couple and a Hungarian aboard across from them introduced themselves, to some excitement from the Danes. There was a polite silence, prompting Otabek to introduce himself, and to Yuri’s quiet excitement, “My boyfriend, Yuri.” There was some excited handshakes and murmuring from all of them about how nice it was to be en route with one of the listed guests - “When I had read that you would be working with Lunarplex I was a little jealous, I must admit,” said the gentleman in the passenger seat.

“It’s a bit of a departure for me, but I’m really happy to be here.”

Yuri flipped through his Instagram as he listened to the conversation; there wasn’t a whole lot of poking and prodding as to why a world-class athlete was here to play music at such a niche event, mostly a lot of welcoming support but they did offer to take the skaters through the registration process and get them together with the staff upon arrival. There were also some questions about his set at Ibiza and where that influence had come from. A bit of pride welled up inside Yuri as he quietly listened to these strangers talk about how they had checked out the catalogue Otabek had available online, liked it a lot, wanted to hear more, and on and on, and were pretty genuine about it all. Not to say that the fans Otabek had at various skate events weren’t aware (nor some of his own fans) of it, it’s just that it still seemed sort of secondary to the skating for them. It grated on him a bit but he also had to concede the fact that Otabek didn’t really treat his DJ work as a side project or anything. It was just another facet of his interests and skills, and some people didn’t get to see all of those, and that was fine. This subculture here that they were joining for the weekend would see this facet of Otabek and probably not mind the skating as much, in turn. There was still excitement for what they did see, though, and that was nice.

Lunarplex was a group of two Swedes and two Germans, three of which were present in time to catch Otabek and Yuri putting their lanyards on and pocketing their voting keys at registration. Gn4rwh4l, a tall, lanky, bronze-skinned man looking more like a model for a Patagonia catalogue than a computer coder, actually commented on Otabek’s jacket and there was a nice little surprise when they introduced themselves. “Hej, hej, hej. It’s good to meet you. Perfect. Braff, put the email down, we’ve got him right here,” he announced. “Otabek Altin. And this is?”

“My partner, Yuri. My boyfriend.”

“Ah, I remember you mentioning. It’s nice to meet you.”

Braff very much looked like a Braff, as well as a ruddy-bearded lumberjack. Definitely Swedish. He was also tall, about the same height as Gn4rwh4l, though Yuri immediately compared him to Celestino: muscular, broad-shouldered. Braff was another person that wouldn’t instantly pass for a computer coder at first glance. He had a handshake that Yuri felt had destroyed more keyboard mechanisms than one could imagine, and he apologized for his mountainy appearance; he’d just been taking samples out in the Alsace. He was an arborist. Gn4rwh4l and Jammer had actually been out with him before they’d arrived. Yuri really, _really_ wanted to say something about his initial assumptions but he thought it might come off as rude. Otabek didn’t. He straight-up said, “You’re a pretty intimidating person, not quite what I was getting from the emails and calls.”

“Ah, that’s Braff, though,” said Konfitürenverordnung - or Jammer, as he said they were welcome to shorten that handle down to, “he’s a softie. He had a bird on his hand just this morning like some sort of Disney princess, didn’t he, Gn4r?”

“He did, it was spectacular. Thought he was going to start singing for a moment. Should have.”

Yuri asked again how to pronounce the first handle Jammer had given, and what it translated into. “Jam Regulation, it’s German and a bit of a joke. They’ve got a real jam regulation office, makes a whole bunch of rules about fruit spreads and marmalade. Everyone hates them. Including me. I’m actually a beekeeper. I’ve got some fresh spring honey here in my bag for the two of you. Hope you like that sort of thing.”

Their graphic designer and third coder showed up just as the little golden jars of honey were handed off, as he was working with other party staff in the outdoor area. He introduced himself as Tausendsassa, which translated roughly to mean “jack-of-all-trades”. Considering he did 3-D rendering, logistics, and a few other things, it wasn’t surprising. He was a little taller than the both of them, and his English was so clear as to be disarming, but he was ‘German as fuck,’ as Gn4rwh4l called him, saying that if you’d put a picture of a primary school-aged Tausend and a younger Rutger Hauer next to one another you’d not be able to tell the difference. Yuri could see it easily. He instantly liked Tausend, though, he was very affable and had offered to be Otabek’s Revision liaison the second it was mentioned he would be there for the party in person after accepting his invites to collaborate and play a set.

“Otabek!”

They turned around to see a couple of men their ages shuffling, up, backpacks on and badges in the process of going around their necks and a couple of large, wheeled bins in tow. One was about Yuri’s height, with ruddy brown hair and a well-groomed beard, a sheepish smile half-hidden within it; the other just slightly shorter, around Otabek’s height, with soft, rosy pink hair and a sharp-featured but still quite young and very tired face.

“Graham,” he said, offering his hand out to them for a shake, his pink, moppy hair flopping about a bit. “Hello, hi, it’s great to meet you, finally. This is Kraken.”

The bearded, shy one gave a nod and put a hand out for shaking. 

“It’s gRAMKracker you’re also with, then,” said Jammer. “Very nice. That’s a good surprise.”

“Well we were hoping to keep it quiet until the end of the compos but all things considered, yes, hello. Lunarplex. Loved your work at CAFePARTY over the fall, s’good stuff.” gRAMKracker were a party from Holland, and were responsible for inviting Otabek to DJ at Revision; they were there at Ibiza, and had been really impressed by the second set he’d performed on Ocean Beach. He’d leaned hard on some trance samples from the 90s for that one. Tracks like Faithless’ “Insomnia” and Van Dyk’s “For an Angel” were on it, as well as some Binary Finary, and they decided they really had to have him out to a demoscene event over it. “I’m not Ferry Corsten,” Otabek told them in his initial email reply, but they’d insisted.

Tausend gave Graham a shrug. “Why the modesty? If Algo said she didn’t invite this one,” he said, gesturing at Otabek, “and we surely didn’t, we really have you to thank, don’t we? And that’s worth a beer or two while we’re all here, I think. Wouldn’t want to short you for that.”

“Ah, well, it’s with a bit of purpose, I think. Um, we had a bit of a disaster, I’m afraid. We’ve lost the drive that we had the demo on a couple of nights ago.” Kraken played with his badge rather anxiously as he spoke. “Fell off the table while it was running and unfortunately it damaged the disc so badly that it wasn’t recoverable. Couldn’t even boot off of it.”

“Head crash, likely. I’m sorry, that’s horrendous,” Braff said sadly.

“We’re rendering the new demo animation tonight it’s just. We’re strapped for the audio file,” Graham picked up.

“I can resend what I’ve got,” offered Otabek. Yuri watched him carefully, and caught some disappointment when Graham shook his head.

“You can, mate, but it’s not going to be the same demo. So we’ve got a couple of options - one, we nix you off the demo and save you the time and embarrassment or two, we try to rework the first arrangement to fit, though I don’t know what kind of strain that puts on you at all. We’ve got the actual animation work done up on the train at least, so there’s that. We can show it to you later on and you can make that decision.”

Otabek didn’t hesitate. To Yuri it felt like he’d already made up his mind to do whatever was needed before any of the options were even provided. “We can re-do it, it’ll be fine. Won’t be the first time I’ve mixed a track overnight, high-stakes.” He fixed Yuri with a look and a wink.

Graham and Kraken seemed extremely relieved, but the worry wasn’t over yet. They did have to get their equipment over and set up in the main hall as he would be competing in the opening round of the live coding showdown, however, so there was an agreement for them to all meet up again afterwards.

Lunarplex did have some previous obligations set but were happy to see Otabek and Yuri over to the newcomers’ table so they could sign up for a short tour of the building and where everything could be found over the party.

This started of course with a reminder that it was the Easter holiday weekend, and a number of the local businesses in the area would be closed due to that. Saturday, tomorrow, would be the next available time anyone would be able to go shopping for groceries or needs (at walking distances, too, which was really nice) but it was important to note that putting out a call or a request for an emergency item could usually be spotted for easily by other attendees or staff. One just needed to ask. The building itself was very notable; it wasn’t just used for smaller conventions and parties like this one but art gatherings and concerts made up quite a bit of its purpose and utility, as well as business and corporate events too. It was a steel factory in a former life - and care was taken to display this history as much as to use it aesthetically. Steel beams and exposed brick walls fit the industrial neighborhood around the campus, but its large glass facing, shimmering in the bright sun of the afternoon, brought it into a more modern, stylish age. An artful one.

They were shown the outdoor area, where several food stands and kiosks, tents, tables, and barbeque grills were being setup and relaxed under and around, and pallets of kegs and other items were being offloaded or trucked inside through one of the service doors.

Back inside they were shown where the restrooms were (down an impossibly long tunneled hallway), where the resting room was (for sleep! One could take naps there!), where the seminar space was, and the second stage that was used for auxiliary events. It was all very nice and familiar already after the walkthrough, which ended in the main hall. And the main hall was huge, and at the moment it was buzzing with activity as people were staking out good places to set up for the weekend, or even just taking a moment to sit and chat or work, temporarily. There wasn’t anything being played over the sound system just yet, but there was a graphic playing on the screen: the invite demo for this year’s party. Yuri liked the theme - a jungle safari - for all of its use of prettily vectored tigers moving in and out of stripey shadows. He half wondered if his wardrobe would be seen as a bit much, full of leopard prints and his tiger sweatshirt. In fact he had on a very nice shirt that was covered in an all-over pattern of monstera leaves on a black background, though dotted here and there where there were breaks in the leaves there was a panther’s face peeking out, with yellow eyes and blue shadows. He wore it unbuttoned and over a plain black shirt and jeans, and he’d already gotten a few high-fives and compliments on it in passing since they’d arrived. It ought to be alright, he figured.

The overall feeling they had was that this was just a giant hang out and an art exhibition of sorts, which was fantastic. Aside from the issue with the damaged demo, they were ready for this creative respite and reset. Otabek looked at the stage and said that seeing the setup in person was a little more daunting than most of the clubs and venues he was used to playing, even in Ibiza, and even when the sets were twice or three times as long. But Yuri could feel the determination behind that. It was a claim to the challenge.

It wasn’t hard to find where Lunarplex had decided to set up shop, and shortly after sitting down with them to eat the fruit and snack bars Yuri had packed, Otabek received an email from his last collaborator. AlgoRhythm. She was checking in and would be in the main hall in a while; she really wanted to grab something to eat first and catch up with some friends before settling into the main hall, but she lugged her travel crate and backpack in just before the start of the live coding showdown. The Norwegian scener was short, and her hair was as colorful as Graham’s. It went from a brassy natural blonde at her roots to an electric green with blue streaks, down past her shoulders. She immediately endeared herself to Yuri, being just slightly older than him, (at 19 the coming fall) showing some serious admiration of his shirt and saying she had a tiger onesie that she was really excited to wear around. She also apologized beforehand about the many questions about figure skating that she was likely going to be asking him and Otabek, and they both promised her it would be fine, they didn’t mind. They quickly pulled out their phones to share photos of their cats between showdown competitors - she fell head over heels for Potya, and he loved her very orange, very massive and very fluffy boy, Thor.

Graham sadly didn’t make the cut to move on to the semi-finals of the showdown (he attributed it to some ‘minor stresses before getting to the party, no worries’), but they were treated to a wildly amazing display of his skills all the same, and those of his opponents, too. He disappeared off-stage at the end of the event and Otabek got up to follow him over to where he and Kraken were working for the afternoon.

Meanwhile, Yuri got a really loose crash-course in some of the other small compo releases Lunarplex had prepared, and eventually asked Algo why she had a Super Nintendo in her crate. 

“There’s a short compo like this showdown where we make music using Mario Paint,” she explained. Astounding, he said. She told him he ought to sit down with her and submit something for it, and he said he likely would, it definitely sounded simple enough for him to participate in.

He thought about heading over to the seminar room to watch the “Scene for Beginners” presentation, but decided against it, settling instead for trying to find Otabek from where he sat and listening to the chatter and work around him as the hall began to fill up and the succession of events led up to the opening ceremony for the party. One of the cameramen wandering the hall and broadcasting during the speeches had found Otabek, and filmed him and Kraken staring intently at the screen of a Mac computer. Graham leaned in and waved. The invite demo was played again, this time with the sound, and things (in an official capacity) got underway.

At some point Graham and Kraken needed to split for another meetup that wasn’t actually at E Werk, but they popped over to get Otabek back to Yuri, and to visit and say hello to Algo before they left. There was the promise that they would be back for the Belgian beer seminar later that night, as they had tickets for it as well and mentioned that they would need to arrive a bit early to get some nice seats as a group.

Otabek took a moment to visit with Algo and review their release once again, as well as play with the Launchpad she’d brought. This didn’t take too long, and once he was happy with how quickly the fun little tool was loaded up with presets, he and Yuri took a break to get some walking in. They also stopped at one of the concession stalls for some hot water for their noodles, and stepped outside to enjoy their little dinner. 

“I had a look at the new demo,” Otabek said after his first few bites, stopping for a moment to make sure the halves of his travel utensil were screwed together tightly enough. “It’s a lot different from the first one - same visual concepts. I think it’s a little better, actually. My opinion.”

“That’s great - feeling confident?”

The older skater nodded. “I wanted to utilize some of the stuff from the original piece, but I don’t know. I’m a bit worried about that. We’ll figure it out, I suppose.” He looked up at Yuri. “Having fun so far?”

“Yeah. I wasn’t sure what to expect really. Looking at the timetable before getting here and looking at it now I want to do everything but also I just want to sit and do nothing and just… watch. Let other people do their work while I watch. You know?”

“Yes, it’s tempting,” was the response, and Yuri had to remind himself that they were still there for Otabek to do his work.

“You’ll do good, I’m confident in you, too.”

“Thanks, Yura.”

He chuckled, and put a fist in the air sort of lazily, cheering gently, as if they were back on the ice. “Davai!” he said.

Around him a few other people yelled, “Davai!” randomly in response (and not all tandemly either), not worrying what they were cheering about, just that someone was cheering and they ought to be cheering, too. There was one final and very excited “Fuck it up, mate, you’ve got it!” from someone at one of the tables. 

They spent the remainder of the evening watching some work displayed on the big screen, playing with the Launchpad some more and watching Jammer finish up a tracked music demo that he squeezed a small shout out to DJ ALTIN into at the last moment. Yuri was amazed to see how the little indicators on the screen seemed to create the letters as they flowed. They also watched a couple of awards events and another round of live coding which was just visually outstanding and had a bit of an upset at the end, to the surprise of everyone in the main hall. Then it was time for them to head to the seminar room.

The beer seminar was packed, and the warning was given out that there was the possibility of running out of seats first, cups next, and hopefully not but maybe beer, so Otabek and Yuri opted to share theirs and huddled close together in their seats. It was at this point in the evening that Yuri got a text from Mila asking if things were okay, so they took a selfie while Otabek was awkwardly trying to hold their empty cup for Yuri as he pretended to be drinking from it. Best to get some glamour shots in now before they were too drunk to do anything but drop their phones, Otabek warned. Algo was a pro at this, so she and Yuri teamed up to snap some good, Instagram-worthy pics while the others made it silly by making the same face and holding up the same peace-signs for a bit before getting in on some nice shots. Braff asked her to send a couple that he really liked, and made one of them his new profile pic. Within five minutes of the request the party staffers had changed his photo out on the website’s seminars page.

"Looks fun, be safe - we’ll be streaming the concert with the link you gave me so tell Otabek it'd better be good," Mila responded after they’d sent her a few of the pics. She was in Italy, still, touring the country with the Crispino siblings and Emil and having a fabulously criminal time, he could see from her own Instagram updates.

By the end of it they were full of alcohol and more knowledge of Belgium than they'd ever thought they'd be, and as the laughing and giggling crowd filed out for the night, Jammer led them up to meet the presenter, and to present him with a wildly large bottle of home-brewed mead made with honey from his bees, pulled comically from his backpack. At this there was some excitement, and then the presenter produced a six-pack of a wheat ale and another of a pale lager in exchange. A couple bottles of each were opened, along with the mead, and split amongst their cups as they had introductions and caught up amongst themselves. Otabek happily took some contact information for the next time he’d find himself in Belgium, looking for breweries or places to dine or book.

They finished their chat and doled out the last of the open bottles they were trading around, and once the presenter was all packed up and ready to clear the room, they all headed outside to the late night barbeque that was going on in the commons spot. A plate of food was reasonably priced (the proceeds went to funding another party like Revision, whose invite was expected Sunday during the PC Demo compo) and Yuri passed on the buns for a burger patty with some cheese and a knackwurst so he could make a little more leeway for what was some of the best potato salad he’d had in his life. Better than the potato salad he’d had the last time he was in L.A. They all sat on the grass to eat and stretch out, and that was when Jammer asked Graham and Kraken what Lunarplex could do to help. A drive crash was a devastating thing and while they were lucky that it wasn’t a full loss of their work, it was still a loss of what they’d been working on for this party.

“We’d like to start with recollecting some music samples that we were building the piece around, that way Otabek has something to mix, and instead of trying to fit it bit for bit with what was already done, we essentially rescore it from scratch.”

“Drop the previous recording entirely then?” Otabek asked, having assumed the worst already, but still sort of surprised by the decision.

“Yes.”

“Well, like I’d said - it wouldn’t be the first time turning out something on the fly but I had samples to work with then, full tracks to tear apart and lay masters and new stuff over. This is. This is from scratch. I’ll need instruments. I need a guitar, a bass guitar. Recording equipment.”

“You can’t just code it straight out?” asked Yuri. “Like what Jammer was doing earlier, with his program?”

“Well, that’s the thing, though. What that was, it was a restricted project, think of that as if I were coding music for say… an old cartridge game. Like a GameBoy. Here, this is just a miniature film and though there aren’t any real restrictions, there’s still competitive challenges you’re expected to meet, and some people do take that seriously. They’re here to fuck about, sure, but to fuck about spectacularly. You know, they like to put on a good show. Push themselves. Here, they have some liberties with the audio though there’s still a lot of coding involved and they want to try not to just use something pre-rendered. You know you can synthesize sounds that come close but honestly if you have something exact in mind you need a really good sample to reference. At worst and if you’d like we can fashion something out of a tissue box and a rubber band, that could help.... But it’s really what you know you’re capable of and what you know you can bend your equipment to do. If you know you won’t be able to replicate what you want, that’s a good place to be at in the process of solving the problem, and it’s time to go find some actual reference material. Or in this case, compose it.”

Yuri sat there, sipping at his beer and playing with the napkin he’d tucked under his plate, and thinking about that. He’d seen Otabek work wonders with bare training, faulty gear, the minimum time afforded to him, rough ice, biased judges. He knew he was capable of playing a full-on concert with tracks, samples, and even masters that were not his own with just a laptop and a good production program (along with the solid drumming of Bobo and the amazing guitar and vocals of Miyavi, of course). It stirred in his chest a bit to think about how much he himself had been given and what was at his immediate access. How Otabek was happy to take on everything he could and everything he’d done, and how turning down an advancement through Yakov’s camps was the genesis of that resourcefulness. By any means best, with Otabek, it seemed. It was what kept him consistently in the top halves and within podium’s sight. He looked up at Otabek, and that feeling he was wrestling with revealed itself to be mostly guilt. He couldn’t really help here. There was that lonesome adversity again. He’d have to play support, just the same as usual for them.

It was frustrating as hell. Even just for ‘fucking about’.

Gn4rwh4l jumped in. “We don’t really have any other viable instruments past the Moog and the Casio. It’s also a holiday weekend. Most of the shops are closed.”

“I’ve only got my Mac, the Linux machine, and the arduino launchpad,” Algo said. “And, well, the Super Nintendo. I’m sorry.”

“There’s a chance a few music shops might be open on Saturday, actually,” said Braff.

Otabek thought on this for a moment. “Can we call them up, regardless? Let them know what we’re hoping to do?’

Graham nodded. “I suppose we could. We can do that in the morning - might be better to see who’s open and explain rather than leave a lengthy, sad voicemail.” This sounded like their best option, so they decided to meet up in the morning over coffee and pastries in the main hall, as it was mentioned there was a Rewe that ought to be open then and some goods were needed anyways. They took a moment to make a list of things everyone might need or want, and Yuri (tired of drinking his coffee black on this trip already) asked for some coconut milk, handing over a few Euros for it and pitching a few extra in for the pastries. Kraken said he could get Otabek’s computer set up to run the demo on spec so that he could have it handy for reference, and Graham said he could go along if he’d like so they could compare their compositional notes and make sure the samples were in line.

There was a small hitch as Gn4rwh4l asked if they were still on for the 5k run - one of the events that Yuri had taken a huge interest in doing while they were there, but Yuri was fine with skipping it, as he wanted to go with Otabek to whatever music shop they could find. Otabek pressed it though, saying that it would be okay, that they could still do the run, it wouldn’t take up too much time. Everyone quickly wondered aloud what else the non-runners would be doing while waiting for them to finish to bolster his point - it was the perfect time to get calls in. No worries at all. They all agreed to meet at the signup table after Tausend’s seminar, the first event on the timetable for Saturday.

With this plan in hand and a lot of additional thanks towards the live music and the Belgian beers they had all loaded up on at that last seminar of the night, everyone felt much better about the state of things. Braff said, very kindly, “That’s scener culture, though. We learn more and do more by getting together more. Rivalries here are more of a joke. I don’t know how different it is for you as athletes. I imagine it’s difficult.”

“It actually is,” Otabek said. “Sometimes there’s a lot of contention between people who are rinkmates, and it’s not just friendly competition.”

Yuri polished off the last of the beer in his cup and leaned back in his seat. They had two more bottles on the table: some Andryyivsky ale from the Ukraine and some homebrewed blueberry lager by way of trades with someone else somewhere during the seminar, so they did a little tasting of their own before splitting them up. They gave a soft “Skoal” amongst themselves, downed it all, then cleaned up the table so they could go to the midnight concert on second stage and dance off the massive amount of calories they’d just had.

Otabek and Yuri made it back to the hotel around 2 am, glow sticks hanging around their necks. Stumbling around in the dark for the light switches in their room’s little entranceway, Yuri heard Otabek’s elusive, soft giggling and committed it to memory, taking the opportunity to lean against him teasingly and saying that he just couldn’t find the light switch.

“You’re not going to find it up my shirt, Yura.”

“Ah, I tried.” He squinted as the lights flicked on, Otabek’s arm outstretched and his hand squarely over the switch. Yuri smiled. He leaned in and kissed Otabek,and there was a soft click - when he opened his eyes again, the room was dark. “Wait,” he laughed, their lips touching a bit stil, breath hopsy and hot. “Wait, wait, let’s at least turn on the lamp by the couch.”

They kissed once more before Yuri pushed away from Otabek and the wall, and shrugged out of his backpack and jacket in one go as he passed the desk along the wall. Behind him, Otabek put his own bag down by the desk as well, pulled a couple of bottled waters out of the little fridge, and turned on the television. Yuri made as big a fuss as he could about kneeling on the couch and stretching out to turn on the lamp that sat near the window and the chair there. It was short-lived as far as sultry behavior went; Otabek touched one of the bottles to the sliver of skin that had bared itself between the edge of Yuri’s shirt and the hem of his pants. The younger skater stifled a yelp and rolled over, trying to warm the small of his back against the couch cushions and throwing his hands up to fend off another attack that was coming straight for his stomach. “You bastard, no,” he said, trying not to yell. “Oh, Beka, you ass!”

Otabek handed Yuri the bottle after a little more teasing himself, and after opening his own bottle, put his free hand inside the pocket of his hoodie to warm it back up. He stood there in the glow of the Weather Channel, toeing off his shoes and taking a moment to hydrate and say something about the music over the forecast before setting his water on the bureau and sitting down - or more or less laying down on top of Yuri and then murmuring into the crook of his neck, “I appreciate you coming with me tomorrow. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine, I don’t mind. It’s time with you.”

“I miss you.”

“I miss _you_,” Yuri said back, struggling for a moment to put the cap back on his bottle so he could put it down on the floor. They lay there, Yuri’s hand in Otabek’s hair, tousling it idly. “I was so upset in Grenoble,” he said, bringing up their first Grand Prix series matchup of the season. “So upset that we didn’t get more time together. I wanted nothing more for your birthday than that.”

“Nothing more, hm?” Otabek said, and Yuri practically saw their hasty, frustrated makeout-session flash like a movie in the Kazakh’s dark eyes. “We had a little bit at the Euros.”

“Sure, but not enough to mess around. Not even in Montréal. I wanted nothing more for _my_ birthday. The dinner was nice, it was fun and I’m glad I could have a drink there, finally, but I wanted… I wanted a night with you. I wanted a good fuck. I wanted you in me. I- I want it now, now that we have the time,” he said, feeling the words leave him before he even knew he shouldn’t have said them. It was crude.

Instead of chastising him, however, Otabek made an interested noise and playfully started to squeeze and sort of smother him, and this turned into a lazy bit of wrestling and tickling. But then Otabek straddled his hips and held him down gently, giggling and fully aware that they were both excited and getting hard over it. He got very serious in the face for a moment, and that was when Yuri was sure that he was going to be chastised. “Yura, you realize this is much, much more than holding hands and kissing each other silly on the couch? This is extremely intimate, and I’d rather it be when we can take our time with it. Take it slow. It’s a very different feeling.” Alright, maybe not a chastisement, though definitely a bit of a warning. 

Yuri laid still after hearing that, huffing and puffing and likely a bit red in the face, but he realized that Otabek was right. His excitement was good but it wasn’t the same as being relaxed enough to do what he wanted to do - more than just a handjob or a blow job. He wanted to be plowed lovingly into the cushions, not painfully. And he only had the most vague idea of what to expect out of this - there was only so much one could learn from internet articles on how to prepare and porn was just… porn and playing around with oneself was good practice for learning limits, but God, did he want more.

He rolled his hips as best as he could with the older skater half on top of him. “And what would you call what we did in Moscow? I had you in my mouth…. You told me yourself about losing your virginity when you first lived in Montréal. On the couch. During a movie. ‘Round my age.”

“Alright. Bad example. Terrible example.” At this, Otabek slid a hand up under Yuri’s shirt and splayed his palm out against the soft skin he found there. He then raked his fingers down Yuri’s stomach as lightly as he could, bringing his hand to rest at the first feeling of the little trail of hair growing past Yuri’s belly button.

“If you regret it, I’m sorry for teasing you about it,” Yuri said.

“I don’t, actually. It was enjoyable, even if it was very different from any expectations I had about it.”

“What did you expect? Maybe my expectations are different too.”

“Honestly I didn’t expect much - I thought I’d have a few more years before I’d even start thinking of such things. It was all just abstract to me at first - like when one reaches those scenes in books and films that try to convey it but you’re not fully comprehending what you’re being told to feel, you just haven’t had that yet, ever. But I said alright, let’s see what it’s about. And it was good. It felt good and I had a patient partner. We also had an impatient one, but I think that wasn’t so much his fault as it was just his excitement getting the better of him. With that in mind I’d definitely like for it to be slow, and something we can ease into at a pace good for you. I don’t mean the joke there. ”

“Him? We?” He smiled a bit at the joke but Yuri was more confused by the previous comment - before he could formulate any solid thoughts on what it meant though, he was interrupted.

“Another time.” Otabek’s fingers had slipped past the waistband of his underwear as he spoke and it pulled Yuri away from the errant remark, causing him to roll his hips again, trying to goad those teasing fingers down further.

He purred, “Sure sounds like it was. But presently…”

“Presently, I’m trying to find out if we are here yet. And if we're okay."

With Otabek's hand right down his pants now, Yuri laughed. "I hope we are. Are we? We’re already this far along.”

Otabek let his hand rest there and gave him a few kisses along his neck and the collar of his shirt. “I think we’re getting there.”

“Let’s keep going, then?”

They moved to the floor and undressed each other rather quickly, frantic like Milan had been, forgoing the chasteness they’d tried to have in France; their clothing mostly piled up towards the foot of the bed and their limbs settled where they could as they kissed and pet, and let themselves be naked against one another, feeling the heat between them and the shifting and soft sliding of their skin as their hips met and their legs tangled together. They rubbed and rutted against one another for such a deliciously long but ever-so-maddeningly amount of time, and Yuri communicated that it was a bit much, a bit too much more than he’d thought - but Otabek wasn’t allowed to stop, he said, over and over as Otabek licked at his palm a bit and took them both in hand as best as he could fit, squeezing them together gently and playing at their very tips with his thumb.

Yuri couldn’t figure out if he wanted to bring his knees up and together around Otabek’s hips and thighs, or if he wanted to try to force himself to splay all the way open as his hips rolled and jerked. He pulled at his loose hair with one hand as he held onto Otabek’s shoulder and bicep with the other, and he was just about certain he’d lost track of time entirely before it completely stopped existing as a concept in his mind, obliterated as a worry in one spine-seizing instant as he came, hard, only vaguely aware of his come spattering across his own midsection as it felt hotter than his own blood in the moment. Moaning and whining a bit and with his thighs shaking, Yuri rode out the rest of his orgasm as Otabek caught up, his hand slick and moving erratically. He breathed in deeply through his nose and out his mouth, taking in the deep scent of the older skater that he loved, and found himself thinking of at the most inopportune times: during practices and warm-ups they’d managed to have together, watching him in the kiss and cry after a program with his chest heaving as hard as it was now, greeting him immediately off stage in Moscow after he’d been under the lighting and dancing about in the stifling heat of the venue.

Otabek pressed his forehead down against Yuri’s shoulder as he came, his breath a short gasp followed by a big, hollow exhale, and his lips and tongue slightly brushing against Yuri’s chest and at his nipple. His hips settled down against Yuri’s as he pulled his hand out from between them. They lay there, twitching and sighing, easing away from being a pile of raw nerves and ecstatic heart rates and re-becoming themselves.

“When do I get to have you in me,” Yuri asked quietly after some time, as he’d had to figure out how to actually form words again with his mind and make them come out of his mouth in the same order, coherently, and that seemed insurmountably difficult for some reason.

“We’re getting there,” Otabek managed to respond, and Yuri let out a laugh.

The next morning they readied their bags for the day with extra sets of clothing and towels, one of Yuri’s elastic wraps for his ankle and the little pot of aloe vera gel he kept in his skate bag, and Otabek’s laptop and extra hard drive, of course. Over cups of yogurt and some apples they then looked at the timetable. There were events they’d be missing through the day if they were successful in finding a music store to visit, but that was alright - they figured they could catch up online when the videos were posted later. It was a little disappointing as they were both very interested in catching the live coding battle’s continuation after having missed the quarterfinals to do the beer seminar. Yuri made them some sandwiches and asked if they still might have the time to take the tour of Saarbrücken - the PC demo deadline was set near the same time, and Otabek shrugged. They may not, he figured. “But I’d bet if we asked the parties kindly they might take us around Monday evening, if they don’t have travel plans.”

“Do you think they’d like to go to the rink in Zweibrücken with us?”

“That’s a thought. Algo might, she seems the sort.”

Yuri started looking up club hours at the rink to see if they might purchase some ice time or if there were public hours available, and made a note to ask what everyone thought of the suggestion - it was near an hour’s drive away, after all. 

At E Werk things were still churning away, party-wise, yet in a very early morning sort of way. There was a line for the on-site facilities - showers, Yuri was surprised to learn about during their site tour - and already the small concessions stands were turning out coffee in airpots the size of the ones he’d seen at Pyeongchang. He really wanted some at that moment, but he also really wanted some with coconut milk, and a good bit of carby pastry. 

Their first stop was to scope out the main hall and see what was happening in there currently. Not a competition as the schedule said they were due to start by noon and it was supposed to be the tracked music compo up first - another one they were sad to miss - but instead the hall was only filled with the smell of coffee and soft morning chatter at the moment. There was a demo on the big screen, but for the most part it was sceners using the space to get some work done. Sheets covered the various equipment setups across the tables that weren't being manned at the moment; and they wandered over to a small group huddled around a computer that looked like a cardboard box. This party had a couple of towers and a monitor setup next to it, and some disk-writing drives in between, and they welcomed the pair over to watch what they were working on: a slip of an old, floppy disk into the older computer's drive, some commands typed in on its large, clackety keyboard, and Yuri was quickly transfixed as a mock-up of a game into started up. It was incredibly detailed for having so few colors, and the animation was cleverly done for as old as the technology was. Low-bit dolphins flew through the sky, breaking up pixelated clouds like ocean waves breaking on the shore and dancing among pulsing and twinkling stars that made up various names of other sceners and teams - the ever-present shoutouts that Yuri really loved seeing. It was a dazzling little video that looked a lot more intricate than he felt something like this computer would normally run, or had ever run in it is lifetime.

At the end of it, they shared in a toast of their cups of coffee and tea and bottles of water, as one of the party members explained to them that this was for a compo deadline sometime shortly after lunch. It had a few techniques that had been in development through the year and they were expecting to be able to debut them, complete, with this release. The computer it was running on, an Amiga, was twice as old as Yuri was. He watched one of the coders run a specifications check on it, making sure it wasn’t going to overheat from just trying to run that little program, and vaguely wondered how anyone in the early age of computers got anything done then - if there was even any kind of comparison to be had between what maximum capacity was then and what constituted it now.

It was sort of like skating. The quad axel and salchow in competition were his, but would someone like Celestino or even Yakov had imagined attempting such elements when they were his age? Hell, ice dancing had only just become an Olympic sport _during_ the early years of the Leroy’s careers. He recalled Nathalie talking at some point at GPX with a publication about how robbed she felt of possibility at times, watching the newer generations of ice dancing teams. “If I could have been successful at even half of the elements we see nowadays,” she remarked, letting that heavily implied disappointment trail off.

They thanked this party and wished them luck, and then headed to the seminar room to catch Tausend’s event. He had a very nice presentation on color theory shortcuts and how to make the most out of what colors one could run on a size-restricted demo. It was not particularly anything Yuri or Otabek were looking to become experts in, but still a very engaging talk nonetheless. Tausend had apparently worked for an animation studio as a colorist for some time, and this seminar was mostly a spill of some trade “secrets” he’d compiled that could bring down file sizes and still create some phenomenal imagery. It was pretty impressive, and made Otabek even more excited to see the other entries in the compo their piece was in, as well as what the party had submitted for other “limited” events.

Tausend called them up immediately after the question and answer session, checking his watch once he was done packing his equipment up and saying that most everyone else would be in soon. There was just enough time for them to get some coffee for everyone, so back towards the main hall they went. 

Not long after, Yuri sat down on a bench to tighten his shoelaces, his pastry devoured and his coffee with coconut milk disappearing quickly. Otabek sat down next to him, tucking his jacket into his backpack so he could hand it to the parties to watch while they hit the streets of Saarbrücken and stretching his legs out some. “Can I ask you something, Yura?”

“What’s that?”

“Would you have been upset if we didn’t get to run this?”

“Of course not. This isn’t what we came here for. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very glad we can still do it, very thankful that they’ll do the duty of calling and speaking to the shops for us but Beka, no, I wouldn’t have.” He sat back, taking a moment to tie his hair up.

“Well. I’ll say it then. I’d have been upset if we didn’t get to run.”

Yuri stared at him.

“It’s not anyone’s fault and I wouldn’t be throwing hands over it, but it’d have been more time away from doing things with you that we want to do.” Otabek stood and grabbed his bag by one of the straps. He smiled. “Even if it’s just half an hour of jogging.”

As they dropped their bags off with the non-runner members of the parties, Gn4rwh4l appeared with a few extra safety pins for their number placards so they wouldn’t be flopping and flying about as they ran. “Ready to eat dust, Yuri?”

“Oh-ho, are you sure you want to be asking _me_ that?” he spat back, and Otabek shook his head, trying not to laugh. “Davai, Gn4rwh4l.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, usually it’s a cheer. To get you going. In this case, I’m telling you ‘Bye’!” he said, wiggling his fingers at the coder, who playfully gasped and held his hand to his chest.

They set their stop-timers as the emcee called for their attention, and once they were counted down, they hit start and sped off.

They got to see the industrial area immediately surrounding E Werk, and it wasn’t a flat-terrain course, to their enjoyment and surprise. It was a big loop with an odd slope that brought them up along a couple of streets and the overpass behind the building. Yuri worriedly wondered where the route was taking them, and they’d stayed fairly close behind the first place runner so they wouldn’t get lost. He looked a veteran to the course and the area. It also helped them keep good time. As they hit the end of the overpass, there were a few signs leading them to a sponsored stop for a cup of beer and a shot of schnapps before they were to make their way down the pedestrian stairwell to complete the trip through a small park to get back to the side of the building they’d started at - Yuri was laughing as they’d lost Gn4rwh4l somewhere past the parking lot at the beginning of the race, and he still didn’t see him in his day-glo running shirt from where they stood, but that was quite alright. It’s what he got for the goading. The beer was cool, and very sweet, and the shot of schnapps got him going again, sending the air down the back of his throat with a bit of a burn.

They were met at the finish line just over twenty minutes later with a cup of champagne and a bottle of water. Otabek placed second, and Yuri third. They gave a quick word to the emcee and the camera crew for the video of the event later, saying that it was a delightful run while the rest of Lunarplex, Kraken, and Algo stood behind them and cheered loudly and enthusiastically for them in the background of the shot. Gn4rwh4l placed twenty-first out of thirty-four official runners, and they all did the same for him as well - watching him shotgun his water and then lay down on the concrete walkway, exhausted. Their prizes were fancy little certificates with their times posted on them, enamel pins that commemorated the event that they could put on their badge lanyards, and the added joy of knowing they could easily overload on food and beer today without much harm done.

With a quick shower and an outfit change out of the way for all of them, they had their assigned address for the first music store that was happy to help - Henning’s, which was about a ten minute car ride away. They roped up a ride from one of the staffers, apologized to the party members who had releases in compos that they would miss seeing today, loaded into the van with a couple more pastries and a refill of coffee, and headed out. Yuri watched the city through the window while he listened to Graham and Otabek talk notes and jump right into the work.

The store staff greeted them warmly, and already had some recording equipment out for them to borrow - lots of tester items and random things, and Yuri watched as Otabek carefully but quickly sifted through it all to find what he felt he would need first, then sort through the rest to see what else there was to offer. This way he could anticipate possibilities or know that there was a solution ready if one was needed in a pinch.

Then Otabek rounded on the wall of guitars, staring each one down pointedly and settling on a very pretty used sunburst Ibanez. He sat down on an extra piano bench the store staff provided him, and Yuri instantly became his laptop stand. There was a little time to chat while the Mac booted up, and when it did, he hooked up the guitar to the laptop using a nice little Behringer interface that was comparable to the one he used at home. With the studio headphones on, he sat there and warmed up for a few minutes, tuning and refining the strings and getting his hands stretched out and ready to play. Yuri stood there and watched him move from anxious to cool and calm once he was happy with the sounds he was producing, and then from cool and calm to outright deadly and determined as he put the pick and guitar to work. 

After a few minutes of playing, though, Otabek stopped, and set the Ibanez aside for another used guitar - a simple red and white Telecaster that looked like it had seen the road for a good while.

This seemed to be it. This seemed to produce the sound he wanted, and for the next hour or so he sat and played, and recorded, and played, and recorded. He got up after some time and let Yuri take a sitting break while he looked at bass guitars, and then they went right back into it. Yuri finished the session at a squat, ready to just get rid of his arms entirely, ready for a meal, ready for more beer. Otabek seemed extremely happy with what they’d gotten done outside of the mixing itself, having done what he could to fashion all their scribblings of the melodic motifs and the noises he and Graham would make to build what they didn’t want to notate into something comprehensible enough to use as a bunch of pseudo master tracks. This was working out better than they thought it was going to. Otabek said again that he really loved the earlier piece but this one would likely prove to be much better due to the laser-focused work they were putting into it in person.

Graham had found a vintage tube synthesizer from the 40’s and sat down at it while they worked, and when Otabek resurfaced for a final break, he realized what Graham was tapping away at. The store staff said they had a mic that could be used if they were so determined to record some samples of it, but that would likely be the best they could get out of it as it was so old. They settled instead for a short video that Yuri recorded, of them trying to play Del Shannon’s “Runaway”. The floor sign on the beast of a synth said that it was the basis for the Musitron used in the song. Yuri pulled it up on his phone for them, first, and they both recognized it off the bat, warmed up a bit, and got right into it.

Otabek cut quite the image there in his leather jacket with the Telecaster humming out of a vintage amplifier, playing such an old tune. No one was singing, of course, and the clavioline wasn’t quite under the hands of a professional, but it was a very good attempt. Definitely Instagram-worthy. Yuri sent a copy of it to Yakov, and then to his grandfather, who had a nicer phone than even Yuri now, as wild as he found that to be.

The store staff of Henning’s considered that payment enough for use of their time and equipment on a slow day bookended by holidays, and took a business card from Otabek so they could check out his music and the various skating videos he had up on his website. He also took several of theirs to hand out as well in exchange. The same staffer that dropped them off came around to pick them back up, and back they went to E Werk, just in time to nab a full lunch off of the barbeque outside, enjoy that ice cold beer Yuri was hoping for, and then eke out a spot next to the gRAMKracker setup for Otabek’s Mac so they could get straight to work mixing and coding. 

After some time of watching that and tiring of it (it was mostly them cleaning up the sound files at the moment), Yuri laid himself out on the floor in front of the stage, using his backpack as a pillow so he could enjoy the compos that were starting to roll out. After some time Algo found and joined him.

“Bored yet?” she asked, kneeling down and offering him some gummy bears from a little bag.

“I’m not much help at the moment. Figured I’d sit down a bit and just watch.”

“Come on over and let’s put you to the millstone, then. If you don’t want to spectate you don’t have to.” Helping him up, she asked if he wanted to make a release for the Mario Paint compo. So he did. She’d setup the Super Nintendo at her work spot, using her translucent pink laptop as the monitor and the recording tool as well. The release she had finished was a cover of Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart”. He was very impressed. He was also a bit concerned - could he put something out that was this good? As quickly? She gave him a crash refresher on using the game to make music and said, “Alright. What do you think?”

“Gymnopedie No. 1 by Erik Satie,” he said, waving his phone. “Sheet music’s all right here.”

Behind them, from Lunarplex’s setup, Jammer said something about exploiting a “low-A glitch”, and she said “Yes, perfect, that’s exactly what I’ll teach him,” before pulling up a midi file and showing Yuri what that meant.

It wasn’t difficult at all. He’d played Mario Paint before, really liked it, and only vaguely knew that it could be harnessed to generate full pieces of music by stumbling across videos of it on the internet. Here was an opportunity to create. His only limitation was the media through which he was building this, but as a beginner of sorts, that was more than okay. After a couple of hours of fiddling with the right notes and learning about and applying the glitch she spoke of, he had a full piece ready to submit. He was very, very proud of it. But he sat there fidgeting with the controller as he spoke, and she watched him move between some of the options on the screen, within the game. He was proud, but also reviewing it, scrutinizing it. 

“Look at you! You’re a scener now,” she said excitedly. “Let me let you in on a secret, though, Yuri, and don’t let this get you harshly. You’ve only taken your first steps here. But I want you to know this. Creative projects usually take a lot longer than one might think to perfect. Sometimes not even to perfect, but just to hit that right moment of ‘yeah, that’s fantastic.’ That’s normal. Expect it. That’s for two reasons. One, any creative process involves dealing with unknowns - from the very start to the very end. And two, you can’t estimate unknowns. A project that hits every goal on its timeframe and is packaged neatly and just right is one where you’re not being creative enough. You’re not challenging yourself enough. You’re not grabbing it and saying ‘I can make you slightly better’ moments before it’s due or while it’s rolling out.”

“Oh. I can get that. So skating. I get that. I push and push, but I also change things up out of frustration or stagnation with a routine and I do that so often that my coaches are to the end of their wits with me at times.” And he could never be sure that he would complete a program to its fullest potential while performing it. He could still be trying to make a program better up to the last competition of the season. A three-minute piece he’d been performing over and over and over might not ever be the same each time. “Falling on a jump I’d perfected and not touched at all? Could negate everything I was hoping to fix.” 

“Exactly. You understand. And you try.”

“We try.”

“Demoscene is that, too. DJing is that, too. Painting is that, too. Knitting and sewing are that, too. Writing, singing, it’s that too.”

“It’s meadmaking, too,” said Jammer, obviously listening in. They laughed, and he said, “Listen, you guys were half done with what we poured out and enjoying it so much but I was still standing there thinking about what more I could have done with that batch.”

Yuri scoffed, “It was good, it was really good. I loved it.”

“My point is - I see you already looking at what you’ve completed and rethinking it. You were doing it before I even brought it up. I know it’s frustrating to watch Otabek having to do all of this again. He’s got an opportunity to do the same thing, and he’s taking it. I was really hoping this would just be a nice getaway, guest weekend for you all,” Algo said. 

“Well. It’s not anyone’s fault. It happens. We’re really not that upset. This is just what we do. You give us a challenge and we’re going to be competitive about it. Even if it’s just fucking about. Fucking about spectacularly. We’re okay, really. Thank you for including me in this, though.”

“You need a handle. Let’s see. You like kitties, obviously. From the choice in music here you are a fancy, classy bitch of a motherfucker,” she said, and he gave one big ‘Ha!’ at that, “and you figure skate. What could we come up with here?”

“I like fancy, classy bitch of a motherfucker, could we use that?”

“If you really want to, yes.” He declined and they thought some more on it before eventually settling on something nice. Burningbyte - a call back to Yuri’s Allegro Appassionato costume that Algo had found to be her favorite after searching him up online, and a small riff on Blake’s ‘The Tyger’, which still had the feel of being a fancy, classy bitch of a motherfucker about things.

She walked him through submitting his piece, and dived back into the cramming the last bit of work she wanted to do for hers before sending it off. He disappeared to go get a couple of beers, and when he returned to the main hall he set one down in front of Otabek, who was sitting at the setup he was sharing with Graham with his headphones on and his eyes closed. He might have been napping. But when the bottle came down, he looked right up at Yuri evenly. “Where’s Graham?”

“Food,” said Kraken, who looked just as beat as Otabek. “We’re rendering. Waiting.”

Yuri looked at the little figurine on top of one of the computer towers they’d hooked up; it was white and silver, and had little clear ears. All plastic. Its face had little colored lights that blinked to the beat of the music overhead as the DJ started up their set. He watched as its head started swiveling, the ears moving. He turned his attention to Otabek, and then pulled him up and out of his seat. “Concert’s starting up in a few here. You need a break. You need to get up and move. Come on.”

“That’s fair,” Otabek said, taking a moment to untangle himself from his headphones, lock his Mac and grab his beer.

They didn’t dance for the full hour and a half set as they were both feeling their long day very much, but they definitely had fun - starting out slow and a little goofy just to limber up, collecting a few more glow sticks between the two of them, and generally just using it as an opportunity to get close, get handsy, get away from work and the world at large. Yuri did his best not to be too much of an exhibitionist, and Otabek did his best not to be an absolute bump on a log or lean too heavily into Yuri, but there were certainly some moments with hands in pockets and breathing against ears and necks that slipped past them and public modesty. Yuri loved it, he loved being able to say with his actions: this is us, we’re together, we’re seriously together. Being introduced all weekend as ‘partner’, ‘boyfriend’, all of that, it just kicked away all of the terrible bits about being awkward and not being sure of themselves about it, and all of the stress of scheduling and time, all of the doubt they both caught with questioning their effort towards one another and towards everything else in their lives. It kicked away the anger and frustration that grew out of it all. This moment here, with the flashing lights and the bouncing beat, Otabek’s smile... it made him happy. Happy to know that they could get above all of that.

By the time neither of them wanted to keep going any longer, they’d worked up a good sweat that was worth sitting down in the comfy chairs to recover from, if not going straight to the nap room over it. Watching the compos that followed let them catch their breath, cool down, and settle back into mixing and working, and Graham had reappeared midway through the first compo, and had brought back two plates full of hot dogs. Not bratwurst, not more knackwurst either, but hot dogs. In buns. Nothing more. Not even chips or salad. They were charred and delicious, and went down well with another beer, though, and the three of them polished off both plates very quickly. 

Around 1am, about the time the last compo demo was screening, Yuri swiveled around in his chair and asked Otabek if they could skip the 2am concert to go back to the hotel. “I need a bed,” he said. That was all he said. Yuri didn’t really want to get into details aloud.

There was some hesitation, and then there was some discussion about finding a stopping point for the night, and then a discussion of what they might be able to skimp on to finish up in the morning. And well, when they could expect to see him back in, in the morning.

“I mean, it’s okay if you need a bit more time. Should I leave the bathroom light on with the door cracked, in case you come back later? That way you’re not looking for the light switch?”

At that, however, Otabek’s demeanor changed enough for him to catch. “Actually, we really should call it a night. I should, at least. Come back to a final mix in the morning? Fresh eyes. Maybe around 9 or 10?”

“Should be good. We made the last deadlines with everything else, this is just the final stretch. We can work on more of the graphic stuff overnight and we’ll see you in the morning,” Graham said, giving them a nod and a tired salute. Kraken gave them a thumbs-up.

“Were you going to stay here all night?” Yuri asked him once they were outside, waiting for the next shuttle to make its pass. The straps of his backpack bit into his shoulders a bit, a sure sign that he was tired as hell. He needed some water, too.

Otabek handed him a bottle, having anticipated it and pulling one out of his bag. “I… was thinking about it. I’m not, but I was thinking I should. They’ve got it handled.”

He took a moment to guzzle some of it down, kind of glad that they were the only people in the lot for the time being. “But you were thinking about it. Look, I know this is your thing, it’s your outlet, this is how you get out and away from the stress of skating and sport and I don’t know. I’ve had a lot of fun, it’s been really neat. It’s been amazing. But like. Maybe - I guess I’m jealous? That you have this - I don’t. All I have is skating. All I’ve known is skating. And training, and performing and I don’t have anything outside of that.” He was going to say something else when some other party-goers walked up, exhausted too, chatting about their day, ready for the next one. The bus arrived, and Otabek helped him in.

They rode in silence for the short ride to their hotel, and were the only ones off the bus at this stop walking to the Mercure. Hand in hand, they walked into the lobby and up to their room. Yuri took his hair down from its messy bun, upended everything out of his backpack, and sat there on the floor. It felt like being on tour again, with he and Viktor taking bets as to who could make the largest mess of the green room with their belongings without losing anything. 

“Yura?” Otabek said after setting his own bag down and putting his jacket aside, stepping over to him and putting a hand out to run through the younger skater’s hair.

“I’m sorry. I’m not mad at you at all, I’m just mad at myself. It’s not fair to you. What I said, earlier, about being jealous… I love what I do. Maybe too much. I don’t know. I’m not looking for a break, I don’t want to stop doing that, I love all that. I just want something else. Something I can make mine and not have to worry about the same way I have to with skating. But at the same time I don’t want these things to become all-consuming, you know? I’ve got you. And you’re not a hobby, you’re not an escape, you’re not my job, either. You’re not any of that and I keep trying to wedge you in there like you _are_ one of those things. It’s been like this for too long.” He leaned against Otabek’s leg, and rubbed at his eyes a bit. “Meanwhile you’re trying to strike a balance and I keep throwing it off, and I’m sorry.”

He felt Otabek’s hand caressing his face and pulling at a lock of his hair, but then Otabek said, “It’s not fair to you either. But you’re right. There’s a balancing act happening, but you weren’t throwing it off, I was. That was me.”

Yuri shook his head. Great. He blinked, his vision blurring a bit. “No, no. Here I was, putting my expectations on you. Are we going to do this again?” he asked after a bit of silence. “Other people’s expectations? And do that to each other?”

“So we’re both there, okay. It doesn’t have to be like that. We recognized it, we stopped, we’re here now. Hey. You _and_ me. We’re competitors. Overachievers. That’s fine. It’s how we are. We can fix that so it’s not so bad when we’re doing fucking-about-spectacularly stuff, it’s just going to take some effort. Some balancing.” Otabek kneeled and looked at him so sweetly, and for a second he really couldn’t stand it. Couldn’t stand how level and even-keeled he was when things were going crazy, but then he remembered just how hard he’d decked J.J. in his own parents’ home. He could feel the corner of his mouth twitch itself into a smirk. “Did you get your Nintendo piece submitted before we left?”

“My what?

“You built a release.”

“...How do you know that?”

Otabek gave him one of those grins that seemed about once in a blue moon or less. “I told Algo if she could talk you into working on something while I was busy I’d get her tickets for Piruetten. Though here now it was just something to work on. She told me you finished it and it was good enough to submit. If you submitted it, well, I owe her a ticket to GPX. She doesn’t know that.”

“You’re terrible.”

“And you love me.”

“I honestly didn’t know what else to do with myself. I was ready to sit there and just watch.” Like watching from the stands, or along the boards, he wanted to say. Practice, competition, even from the podium, only able to watch him. And he was sure that Otabek knew that feeling.

“I know. You said you wanted to. Being alone wasn’t part of that. But I know. Because I love you.” At that, Yuri sat there, half sniffling, and half-laughing. And Otabek leaned in for a kiss. Yuri felt it shoot straight along his jaw and right back down his spine. When they ended it, Otabek told him, “We’re okay.”

“I really fucking hope we are,” said Yuri, going in for another kiss.

It was a hard kiss, starving and a little angry, and neither one of them wanted to be the first to break it but at last Otabek pulled away, their chests heaving as they realized how stupid that was. They’d both been holding their breath through it. Yuri stared at him, his lips stinging from being so crushed, so quickly, his eyes wet. Otabek really looked ready to cry too, which shocked him. It was stupid. They could at least agree on that. It was also stupid to be mad about, but with everything else Yuri knew they couldn’t be so surprised to be so bent out of shape over it. 

Yuri craned his neck a bit as Otabek came in for another kiss, and Yuri wrapped his arm around him and pulled him closer. Only it knocked him off balance and led to him gently rolling Yuri down onto his back from his sitting position and laying down on top of him.

Yuri sheepishly smiled at Otabek, running his hands up and down his back idly and pressing hips hips up a bit, and said, "I feel like an absolute jerk for asking but I am _really_ keyed up at the moment, and you're, um... Can we… can we maybe--"

"I can tell, do you want to--"

"If you--" 

They fumbled about for a bit, kissing and pawing and practically trying to get undressed without taking their hands off of each other. Yuri groaned, fully hard and having a little difficulty getting his pants and boxer briefs off without extra help; Otabek used it as an opportunity to play with him now. As Otabek settled between his legs, pulling Yuri's hips up onto his thighs, he was ready at first for another go at what they'd done the night before, that same, delicious feeling at the base of his cock when Otabek wrapped his hand around his shaft that traveled up his sides, but then he watched as Otabek stuck his thumb in his mouth for just a moment, covering it in spit, and then pulled it out and brought it down, pressing it right up against Yuri's anus. It made him squirm and gasp, and he put his hands up above his head, finding some purchase by grabbing at one of the legs of the desk.

It _was_ different and it took him a bit to adjust, and it helped to hear that he could say anything he needed to: if it was to stop, if it was to go faster, if he didnt like it, if he wanted more. He thought he'd be able to take advantage of it, only again it was just so much for him to process - Otabek had finally pushed the tip of his thumb inside of him and kept it there, kept rubbing at him and massaging, and it was hot, watching him so concentrated on what his hands were doing and _feeling_ what his hands were doing.

Yuri almost found himself coming a few times, his back arching as Otabek's grip tightened on him and then relaxed ever so slowly, and he was so glad when the older skater took both of his hands away, running them up his torso as he slid out from under Yuri's hips.

"Turn over, Yura," he said, and Yuri didn't quite do so in time; he was watching Otabek get up and walk over to the bathroom, taking his own erection in hand for a moment as he stepped away. Suddenly a towel came flying at him, followed by a couple of pillows from the bed. He sat up. "Over," Otabek said again. "Get comfortable."

Yuri gathered up the pillows and laid the towel out, and then laid himself out on top of it. He buried his face in the pillows, trying hard not to rub himself off just yet. It was tough. The towel was soft as hell and he could feel the skin of his backside getting all prickly from being so exposed. After a few more quiet moments, Otabek’s footsteps came around and he knelt down again, dragging a hand along the calf of one of Yuri’s legs, up to the back of his knee. Yuri made a short, surprised sound as with his other hand, Otabek gobbed down some of Yuri’s aloe vera gel. It wasn’t too cold, but he also wasn’t expecting it, either. He got a whispered apology in his ear as Otabek rubbed at him a little more, working in a finger up to the last knuckle and kissing him all over his neck, his shoulders, his ass. The younger skater enjoyed that bit, raising his hips up a little, causing Otabek’s finger to rub and bump right against his prostate, drawing a deep sigh from him and the feeling that his stomach was going to just curl so far inward on itself.

After a while, the finger was gone, and Otabek came down again with more kisses all the way up his spine, until Yuri could feel the tip of his penis pushing against his hole, sliding along his crack as Otabek’s chest came to rest against his back, hot, their skin sticking a bit, not quite slick yet. Yuri heard him say again tell him to stop, tell him to keep going, tell him whatever he needed to, and he gave a quiet “Okay.” And Otabek, with a slippery hand to help, pushed himself in.

They took it slow, so slow. So absolutely, murderously slow, and Yuri was glad to admit that they had. It was not the same as having a finger inside him, or a toy (at least one of the one’s he’d played with, those were definitely a bit thinner), and it was incredibly mind-blowing being able to feel Otabek twitching, pulsing, moving inside him, and so deeply. He did his best to stay calm and relaxed, and quiet enough so as not to disturb any neighbors but truthfully that in itself nearly brought him to climax again, moaning into the pillows as the thrusting grew from shaky and just a little hesitant to measured, purposeful, and the best thing Yuri was sure he’d ever experienced. At least until he came. Which, afterwards, he decided that _that_ was the best thing he’d ever experienced.

Yuri buried his face in the crook of his arm, his body still shaking and twitching. He lay there muttering to himself as Otabek finished, his breath hot in his ear, lips still kissing at his neck and his jaw as Yuri felt his thrusts tighten up just so, felt every muscle in him seize against him, in him, and felt him release, and release everything else all at once too, his weight coming down on Yuri for just a moment before he shored himself up on his forearms again and rested his sopping forehead between Yuri’s shoulder blades. 

Later, as they lay between the cool sheets, showered, hair braided, and drifting towards sleep, he tiredly kissed Otabek’s face, over and over. That was exactly what he’d wanted. He could want it again, surely, and he was determined to.

It was the dawn of the final day - deadline loomed at 2PM. 

They arrived at E Werk around 9 in the morning, coffees in hand, backpacks on their shoulders, and game faces on, and for just the barest moment Yuri felt like he was walking into an ice arena more than ready to dish out some hard knocks. He was humbled when he remembered that it wasn’t a short program he had submitted for review but a short song made on a video game.

That was alright, though. Tausend was up at Lunarplex’s workstation, chugging away at both coffee and code. “Hey, I saw your piece while compo staff were reviewing it,” he said, and Yuri found himself pleasantly surprised. “Good stuff. You planning on doing some tracked music pieces now? You know, that, but without the Mario interface. This.”

A glance at the screen of the computer Tausend was working on drew Yuri’s curiosity. It really did look a lot like what he’d done with Mario Paint. “Maybe,” he heard himself reply. Otabek put his hand on his shoulder and gave him a soft kiss on the cheek, and he could feel his whole face light up just a bit hotter than it already was. “We missed that compo - we’d gone to Henning’s by then.”

Tausend looked up at them both excitedly. “The video of it is up - we can watch it if you’d like, I need to myself so I can put my vote in for it, still.”

“I might just do that, unless… Beka needs me for something?” Yuri asked, smiling at Otabek.

“At the moment, I think we are set. I’ll come and get you once we’ve finished the demo and you can watch it before we submit it.”

“I actually would rather be surprised.” And he did. He’d seen all of the first version they had, and then caught bits and pieces of the second one while he was helping out during recording, and he was really looking forward to seeing it on the big screen in front of them there in the main hall, where it was meant to be seen. Truthfully he also didn’t want to jinx this version. “Davai!” he said, happily. From somewhere off around them there were a few random, tired, but still pretty enthusiastic cheers of “Davai!” and one “Fuck it up, mate! You’ve got this!” It was a little embarrassing, but someone close off to the side said “This sure isn’t the nap room.”

Before too long, however, the nap room certainly was invoked. The main hall had filled up for the mid-morning music compos, and gRAMKracker and Otabek had completed their final render, their final final execution and runthrough, and their final final final overall review of their release, and submitted it to the information desk. In the time it took Graham and Otabek to drop it off, Kraken dismantled and packed up the bulk of their workstation back into its tubs, and then set a timer for them to come back around 4 for the rest of the event. 

They stopped by Lunarplex and Algo’s setup to chat for a minute and to drop off their tubs for watching. Then they disappeared down the hallway to the nap room for a well-earned bit of sleep.

Yuri got up to give Otabek a hug, and then let him have his chair to sit in. Then he sat on his lap. “Beka, I’m proud of you.”

“I’m proud of _you_,” the older skater said, running his hand through Yuri’s loose hair. “We have some time to take the tour of Saarbrücken, if you still want to do that.”

“I do need to get up and walk around some, I’ve been sitting here learning all about tracker modules and learning about the compos that were just on and my brain is a bit scrambled.”

They enjoyed the tour, as short as it was, but it did allow them to walk almost the same route that they had completed during the 5K run and was a great refresher on the site’s guide to what else the city had to offer. It really was pretty walkable, at least the area they were in, and they made plans to come back through Tuesday with some of the available audio tours, and maybe even take a trip to the museum and the zoo. By the time they returned from the little “tour” seminar, Graham and Kraken had returned from their moratorium on being conscious and food and drink were sought out by the parties. Yuri and Otabek posited the offer to go to the ice rink in Zweibrücken for a nearly private skate session, and as everyone else had arrived by train and therefore had the liberty of buying a return ticket as needed, there was a resounding “Yes!”

The last few rounds of compos started; the first block was several short demos, including the Mario Paint submissions. Yuri’s got a very grand round of applause as the emcees announced that it was a first-time submission from a first time scener. A lot of the conversation around them leaned hard on how good it was for something so simple, yet so complex melodically and with regards to the timing. Algo, Jammer, and Braff each had some individual releases that they caught live here, to much applause and cheering. Braff had put one out that he called “Tree Simulator 2020”, and it was an absolute blast to watch his little fake pitch for a silly fake game. A spectacular fucking-about, Gn4rwh4l said of it. It was really interesting to see the number of joke entries, and to see which ones apparently held clout as running gags. From releases that had Swedish songs about moose, to releases that looked god-awful but had weirdly endearing characters and narration (to put it nicely, truthfully Yuri was absolutely horrified by Spacepigs’ Kevin), to interesting art-house sort of releases that were digs at other pieces or creators, as evidenced by a lot of the good-natured jeering and heckling. Along with joke submissions were a slew of releases that doubled as invites to future Demoscene parties, much like Revision: short advertisements with dates, special events to draw interest, and attending guests, all bright and fun to watch, and very tempting to go attend. Yuri found himself already looking for off-season dates.

Close to the end of the last block of releases, Tausend and Otabek disappeared to meet with organizers so they could get the stage and his equipment ready for his set. He had indeed borrowed Algo’s Launchpad and loaded it up with all sorts of good samples and bits from his collaborations with each group over the weekend, playing with it while files rendered and converted, and tracking was fine-tuned. She stood there at the edge of the stage in her tiger onesie, attaching a glow stick to the jump ring of Yuri’s lanyard and cracking it dramatically while he sipped at a bottle of water, explaining to some nearby sceners that they’d been chatting with, “That’s my boyfriend - he’s really good at what he does,” and regaling them with the first time he got him in on a collaboration. “I bit his glove off, it was scandalous, I got in so much trouble with my coaches for it!”

But as the emcee introduced him and he started his set, it wasn’t hard for those sceners to pick up on the wild, thrumming, sensual beats that DJ Altin could spin. There was a little of everything for everyone - from EDM overlays to French house staples, crunchy, vintage-sounding synthwave to deep 90’s club cuts, and of course the tunes that he’d composed for the parties. Some sceners recognized them off the bat and cheered, including Algo, who didn’t stop bouncing from the first to the last note.

Yuri hadn’t, either. He let loose and let the music and the lights carry him, enjoying a spot where Otabek had mixed in a sample of Inferno’s “From Paris to Berlin” and practically eye-fucking to the crescendo built there. He’d been so upset to miss out at Poblenou that first time he realized what he had in meeting Otabek. This was important, it was an incredible outlet to have and he was very gifted at it, it came to him in a manner that didn’t seem so difficult as skating, but somehow that didn’t lessen either occupation, nor vault one over the other. There was a balance across it and Yuri was glad it could be found and maintained.

He’d had it in his head since the night before that it was possible for him to find that, too.

The last leg of the set ended on some feel-good, familiar and driving beats that he could put on autopilot and let be, and Otabek pulled him up onto the stage to dance, rounding out the two hours he had to fill with a solid mash-up of Eric Prydz’ “Call On Me” and the bass tracking from the first version of his release with gRAMKracker, and with Yuri held tight in his arms. By the end of it the levels of serotonin in the room were as palpable as the good beer buzz everyone had going to match. Yuri gave him a bit of a sloppy kiss (which was caught on the livestream and would be uploaded, complete with Algo’s exuberant yelling about it, later on to YouTube with the rest of the weekend’s videos) and when it was time for Otabek and the staff to clear the stage, he helped gather up equipment and move the portion of steel barricade they’d put up in front of the table, but not before he got Algo to snap a photo of him and Otabek in front of the DJ Altin banner that was tied to it.

There was enough time before the last few compos to get another round of drinks in, as they stood out in the grassy outdoor area, under one of the lot lights, Yuri realized he had a text from Mila -

“Get it,” with a winky emoji as well. 

He sent back, “Got it,” also with a winky emoji.

“!” was the response to that. He let that be.

They decided to sit on the floor for the last few viewings, and their PC Demo was the last release to be shown. The emcee explained that it had basically been rebuilt during the party, and that shouldn’t be the only reason people ought to consider giving it their vote - but it definitely was a fantastic, exploitable, and downright justified reason to consider it. “This is ‘Star Light, Star Flight’ by Holland’s pinkest and quietest, gRAMKracker, featuring DJ Altin - whom you just saw on stage a bit ago. Should be a good flight if you liked that set.”

The demo's load screen started as any of the rest of them, however after a few seconds it shifted into a sort of screen-crawling, Star-Wars-esque opening, finishing on a black screen full of stars. There was a spot of white towards one of the bottom corners of the screen that seemed to be growing bigger and bigger, before it shimmered a few different colors and suddenly cracked across the dark, starry expanse - much like ice breaking. It left behind a multicolored, sparkling chasm across the screen, and the shot panned outwards to reveal a small, gray spaceship. Its thrusters fired up and it soared towards the now giant crack that seemed to be forming in the fabric of space and rending it apart. It seemed to scan what was in front of it with a “net” of green lasers, sweeping across it all like a pensive flashlight.

There was a sudden bolt of neon lightning. It just barely skimmed the ship, which turned tail and fired itself off in the opposite direction a split second later.

The cracks of light and color followed it, beginning what turned into a dazzling, psychedelic interstellar chase to a song that definitely had Otabek's rock-genre mark on it, parsed out among a hard techno beat and operatic synth riffs and leads. There were twists, turns, and even a quiet moment where the ship came to rest, hiding in a quintessential meteor field, hoping to buy itself some time while trying to outrun the bright anomaly. After a few silent beats the meteors started to move, almost as if the ship was moving forward. But it wasn’t - the chasm seemed to be pulling everything towards it. The colorful cracks started to appear again, creeping in from one side of the screen to the other, and the music seemed to come to a peak before falling in on itself, a cacophonous collapse of sound that came once again to a dead silence as the ship disappeared in the growing, brimming light and color of the chasm.

And it started up again, exploding with the color on the screen as the little grey ship was propelled down a kaleidoscopic, neon and day-glo tunnel that was visually reminiscent of the Star Gate scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey. As the music reached the end of repeating the melodic section a few times, it came to a brake-burning skid of a stop, ending with a loud pop sound effect - the little ship appeared once again in the starlight void of space as if it had just been deposited out of warp drive, nose facing the viewers in the hall straight on, only now it was the same, almost-holographic shifting color the chasm had been instead of the grey that it was first seen to be.

The cracks and chasm were nowhere to be found. It was just space again. Regular. Old. Space.

The little ship broke out its scanner “net” again, and washed the screen it, and the scene ended in a flash of shimmering color, and a white screen. The credits ran while the main track theme played again, and it included shoutouts to various sceners. There was a “special thanks” to Revision and Henning’s staff, Lunarplex (going through their names individually) and AlgoRhythm, and lastly, to Burningbyte. Yuri, still trying to process the actual demo itself, saw that and immediately looked at Otabek, who gave him a smile.

This was probably the highest number of those unguarded smiles he’d ever seen from him since they’d met, and Yuri cherished this one a little bit more than the rest.

It ended entirely on the gRAMKracker logo with a nicely stylized DJ ALTIN right under it. The screen flashed back to the command window, and the house lights came up slightly. The crowd in the main hall that had been watching lost it. Absolutely lost it.

“Oh, put that in the Louvre,” said one of the announcers, which garnered a bit of heckling from some of the French parties in attendance. 

Another, catching the Kubrick reference, said, “My God, that was so full of stars.”

They were able to ride that high all the way out to the end of the last concert of the party, calling it quits at 4am; all their missed compo viewings were caught up on, votes cast, talks talked, hands shaken, alcohol danced out of their systems. It had truly been a party and Yuri and Otabek were more than glad to have broken away from their lives otherwise to have been there. When they finally got back to the hotel though it was like hitting the boards - they fell straight into bed, half-undressed and too tired to even say more than some quiet goodnights and some soft gratitudes and affirmations of their love. 

Yuri woke up around 8:30, and was wide, wide awake. Upset that he was pretty much running on three hours of sleep and couldn’t get back to it, he got up to do some stretching and quiet exercises to get his body out of the painful hangover state it was in. He showered and ate a breakfast of oatmeal and some of their lunch meat, and polished off two bottles of water. All well before Otabek was up at 9, and into the shower at 9:05.

“I figured you needed the extra hour,” Yuri said, handing him some coffee as he sat down to towel off. “We should have just slept in the nap room.”

There was only one shuttle running for Monday, and they were downstairs in time to catch it easily. It picked up passengers along each stop and was nearly full by the time it arrived at E Werk, where they off-loaded and headed straight into the main hall. Algo had packed her station up completely, but was sat in the spot she’d commandeered the whole weekend, pink laptop open and running the old Windiws aquarium screensaver. Behind her, Lunarplex was breaking down their set up. Shortly before 11 gRAMKracker joined them, their hair still wet from the showers and somehow both very chipper for having spent the last of the night and most of the morning crashed out in the nap room.

Tausend tapped on Yuri’s shoulder and shook his hand, saying a little sadly, “I’m letting you know now that you didn’t place with your Paint demo, but they give out certificates to first-time submissions. Info desk asked me to get it to you.” He took a manila folder that had been sitting on the table and handed it to him.

Inside of it was a plastic sheet protector holding a silly little certificate done up with Mario Paint graphics. It had his scene handle printed on it. Otabek insisted on getting a photo of him with it, and Yuri balked. “My hair is a mess,” he said. “I look like shit, Beka.”

“You look like you were up all night coding hard for your win, a true scener,” said Jammer.

At last, he relented. It was as good an achievement as any skating medal, he felt.

The parties also took a few more prizes amongst them and their individuals, making their way up on stage for their awards, handshakes and photos. As the compo categories and the stack of awards on the table ran down, Yuri got himself up off of Otabek’s lap where he had been sitting. “You’re likely going to get up in a bit here,” he said to him, grinning. He leaned on the back of the chair, waiting, the anticipation mounting - there was the third place winner announced. The second place winner. And finally, to complete excitement from everyone in the hall, the emcee announced that “Star Light, Star Flight” had taken the vote for best PC demo.

Yuri burst into joy, exclaiming in Russian proudly as Otabek got up out of his chair, following Graham and Kraken up to the stage. “That’s my boyfriend,” he yelled again in English. “I love you, Beka!”

“Wow, thank you, hup Holland hup,” Kraken said shyly into the microphone to many repeated cheers in the audience from other Hollanders, stepping back almost immediately with a small wave for Graham to take his thanks also, mentioning Algo and Lunarplex again, and pointedly thanking Yuri for his patience, with many apologies as well to go with.

Graham stepped aside to let Otabek have the last word, patting him on the back. “Many thanks to our new friends,” said the skater. “You’ve been a wonderful, welcoming crowd, and it’s been a joy to spend a weekend with you.” He thanked them again in some almost rambly Russian, and gave Yuri a sentiment as well. Some sceners in the hall that spoke the language yelled excitedly at it and Yuri found himself wondering if maybe he should thank J.J. for taking that knock on the chin to get his suggestion heard. 

Braff asked what was said, and Yuri told him it mostly translated to “I treasure my creative time here and thank you for giving me that time and thank you for the opportunity to enjoy and express myself. It was a reclamation and it was needed.”

“That’s classy,” said Braff. “What’d he say about you?”

“That I was too patient. That he wants to kiss my face a lot,” he replied, and then kept the last of it clean. The second Otabek had come back down from the stage, taking him up in a bodily lift that Yuri was sure would have knocked them both down on their faces on the ice, he whispered in his ear with a bit of a snicker, “Don’t be obscene. Now people know you got laid this weekend.”

“Got to get some sort of exhibition in at the end of the competition, don’t we?” Otabek laughed, bringing him back down for a kiss on the cheek. 

“Davai, Beka,” Yuri said.


End file.
